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“There is no mercy in this world.” “Why?” the dwarf asked in a cracking voice. “I’ve done nothing!” “Everyone has done something.”
“I warned you. If I ever saw you again—” “We’re immortal, Tin. There’s plenty of time to kill me. I have a job for you, so you may as well make your fortune first.”
“You remember Dorothy, don’t you?” Tin narrowed his eyes, his grip tightening on his weapon. It was rather hard to forget the little human girl who’d crashed into his life and set him on the path to self-destruction.
“There’s no place like home, Dorothy. Because this is the only place that’s real. Oz never existed.”
The silver slippers that had taken her back home hadn’t been on her feet when she’d awoken ten years ago in the wheat field. If it was real, then where were they?
“Oz,” she whispered, almost dropping the rifle. “No, no. That can’t be it.” Aunt Em would be ashamed if Dorothy chose to believe, if she slipped down that yellow brick road of insanity again. After all the work Aunt Em had put in to reversing Dorothy’s delusions.
“If you’re Dorothy,” he said carefully, “Where’s your little rat, Tutu?” Her eyes narrowed. “Toto.” “That’s what I said.”
He was grateful the Gnome King hadn’t known because if the few short years with a beating heart had taught Tin anything, it was that emotions made a mess of everything. It was a welcomed event when Oz’s magic wore off and his heart solidified again. Dorothy could keep her wretched thing thumping in her chest.
Something told Tin that Dorothy wouldn’t appreciate hearing how his new profession was murder.
Lion’s courage driving him into darkness,
And when his stone heart had become a live, beating organ, he’d even cracked a smile at her before she’d left. That perfect smile had remained with her while back in Kansas, the one she’d always sworn to herself that she’d see again. There were no smiles now.
“Once a villain dies, another always rises. Good doesn’t always conquer evil.
“Tell me who I need to kill, because I don’t think you did this to yourself.” He stiffened at her words. The thought of Dorothy killing anyone made him irrationally protective of her and her still-pure heart.
Glinda hadn’t done much outside of giving Dorothy the silver slippers. She had probably floated away in her fucking bubble and got distracted by will-o-wisps on her way home.
But Dorothy… Her heat, her compassion, sent humming vibrations through him even now.
Dorothy was nearly at the edge of town when he bolted after her. He snatched her wrist and spun her to his chest. A small gasp escaped her as he pressed her into a wide tree trunk, trapping her there with his weight. “No sane fae goes to the Emerald City.”
“I was paid to do a job, and I always follow through.” “Is that all I am to you?” Dorothy lifted her chin, her eyes no longer glassy. “A job?” Was it? A muscle ticked in his jaw. She was a job but was that all?
She was a job. Soon her face—this flawless face—would no longer belong to Dorothy. It would sit in a glass case or, worse, on Langwidere’s shoulders. Would Lion be with his lover while she looked like Dorothy? Would he part her lips with his tongue and explore? Stare into these warm brown eyes as he entered her?
The emotion startled him almost as much as the trepidation he felt at being run out of town in front of her. He didn’t care about the townsfolk or their opinions. He didn’t. Dorothy was … different.
His fingers moved unconsciously to his face. If it wasn’t for the iron snaking across his cheek, maybe he would have been able to blend in enough to secure a better room for her. A woman on the path to death deserved that much—at least this woman did.
Tin gripped the fabric over his chest. Something behind his breastbone cracked, shattered, exploded and a painful pounding suddenly assaulted him from the inside out. He gasped, his wide gaze locking onto Dorothy’s sleeping form. The raging pulse in his ears, the heavy thump thump thump beneath his ribs. His heart. It was back. Fuck!
What the fae of Oz didn’t realize was that Dorothy had always been just a girl. It was all because of the silver slippers—that was what had given her the magic to defeat the Wicked Witch. And anyone who put on those slippers could have done the same, but for some reason no one seemed to care about that fact.
And, for the record, my brain is perfectly intact because I took the time to nurture it. You let your heart harden, just as Lion let his courage deprive him of a real connection with anyone.”
I have no power to help the South. The slippers are what helped me before, and now that I don’t have them, I’m nothing. Only a woman with a machete, who wouldn’t be able to hold her own against a true warrior. So everyone here needs to stop believing that I’m some miracle saint, because I’m not. I’m Dorothy Gale, a farm girl, and that’s all I’ll ever be. Even then, I may have been stronger as a child when I held hope and believed nothing bad could happen in the world.
“You once told me fairy tales to build my courage. Remember Snow White? She was never the hero, only a damsel in distress. The witch had truly won, because Snow White did indeed eat the apple. There’s no prince here to save you. From your story, I wanted to be more like the Evil Queen, so thank you for that. And thank you for making my job easier
Something thrummed in Dorothy’s veins then. It was familiar, achingly familiar, but it couldn’t be. It was the same inner strength she’d dredged up when she’d worn the silver slippers and used their power, except she wasn’t wearing the shoes now. Dorothy’s veins pulsed harder, almost like they were stirring up a tinge of magic.
Deeper and deeper she tapped into the silver, as deep as she could go. Like a shooting star, something within her—perhaps magic—exploded outward.
“No, sweetheart.” Crow paused and fidgeted with the ropes hanging down his chest. “You’re fae. A changeling who was glamoured to live among humans.” Tin exhaled impatiently. “If we’re having this conversation here, let’s cut straight to the point so we can get somewhere safe. Crow’s your father.”
“It’s yours,” he vowed. “You resurrected my heart when I thought it was gone forever, so its fate is yours. Rip it out and burn it to ash if that makes you happy. But know this: no matter how long you allow me to keep it, I will cherish this gift and use it to protect you.”
“So dramatic, Tin. Who knew hearts came with a heaping side of valor?”
“Her mother is Reva.” Tin stared at Crow, the name processing as slow as molasses. He couldn’t mean… No. That was impossible. Dorothy’s mother couldn’t be the Wicked Witch of the West.
Tin stood naked, staring at his pile of dirty clothes. After his bath, he would need to give them a good shake, but ridding himself of filth wouldn’t be so easy. One day Dorothy would realize he wasn’t good, and she would leave him. No amount of time could take away the blood already staining his hands.
“Yet somehow through our fights, our arguing, we fell in love with each other, even though we were completely opposite in every way. I loved her, truly loved her … I still do. Then you came along, and Locasta showed up at your birth. She’d been planning her actions for some time. We didn’t know, yet we should have been prepared anyway. Locasta first cursed your mother, then took you into her arms. She told me she was turning you into a changeling before she cursed me to the cornfield—the place where you eventually found me—with a scrambled brain.”
“What about the human I was swapped with? Where is the real Dorothy now?” “I don’t know.” He placed a hand to his chin and shook his head.
“What happened to the Dorothy who was going to conquer everything? What happened to the Dorothy who locked me in a room and snuck away to do what she believed was right? That confident Dorothy.” Her shoulders slumped. “She’s hiding. That Dorothy didn’t know she was fae, that Dorothy didn’t know she killed her own mother, that Dorothy didn’t know she could be the reason her father might be dead, and that Dorothy didn’t know there was a lunatic fae female collecting heads and wearing them for pleasure!” “Well”—Tin leaned forward until his nose was touching hers, his breath warm against her
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“Why, young goose, I have her same dress”—she swished the material side to side—“her same words, and even her same head. I am very much Glinda.” “You killed her?” Dorothy raised the machete, her entire body trembling. “But of course I did. Since I’m wearing her head, I hold all her magic.”
“Just because she brought your heart back to life doesn’t mean she wants you.”
“I have a secret meant only for you. My name isn’t Dorothy. That name never belonged to me. It’s Thelia Tunok Turolla, and I’m giving that to you because I’m falling in love with you, too.”
“My axe is yours, Thelia. My axe, my life, and my heart.” “I promise to take care of them,” she replied with tears glistening in her eyes. “Always.”
